The Coming Storm (41 page)

Dianne awoke with a start. Had it all been a dream? She felt her stomach and realized the relative flatness. It wasn’t a dream. She’d had the baby and he was healthy and safe. She closed her eyes again.
Thank you, Lord. Thank you so much
.

The wind moaned softly, rattling her windows. Dianne glanced toward the open draperies and realized it was snowing. Somehow it all seemed fitting.

“So you’re finally awake.”

Dianne looked to the door, where Dr. Bufford stood peering in. “I just now opened my eyes. I’ve never been more tired.”

“You had a hard time of it. Wears a body out.” He came into the room and reached for her wrist. “I just want to check your pulse.” He smiled. “Feels strong and steady. Always a good sign.”

“Where’s the baby? Where’s Luke?”

“With his proud father. He’ll be wanting you soon enough, though. Koko fixed him up with a sugar-teat for the time being, but he’ll need to be put to your breast soon.”

Dianne felt her cheeks warm at the comment. “I want to thank you again for coming,” she said, quickly changing the subject. “I know you don’t care for the way things are here. I know you’ve avoided coming to our parties or to church.”

“I have only the highest respect and admiration for you, Mrs. Selby,” Bufford said, stroking his bearded chin. He looked tired and Dianne wondered if he’d managed to sleep. “I was happy to come and lend a hand.”

“Can you sit for a moment?”

He pulled up a chair and eased into it. “My knees are bothering me something fierce,” he admitted. “The cold weather always does it. I suppose I’ll always be a Southerner at heart.”

“I see it’s snowing. How long has that been going on?”

“It started just a little after the birth. Looks like it’ll be going on for some time.”

“You will stay with us, won’t you? We’d love to have you for the holidays. I know you’re all alone out there, and we’ll have plenty of food and festivities.” She paused, seeing him stiffen. “I know you’re uncomfortable with people of color, but these are good folks, Dr. Bufford. They would give you the shirt off their back or their last bit of food. They are truly kind people, and I know we’d all be honored to have you here to celebrate the birth of Jesus.”

For several moments he said nothing. Instead he stared at his hands as if weighing the situation. “I haven’t celebrated anything in a long, long while.”

“Please, just do this as a favor to me. I know I don’t have a right to ask, but I truly want you to be here with us.”

“I’ll stay,” he said, looking past her to the window. His voice sounded hard, almost irritated. Had she gone too far?

“Please forgive me if I said the wrong thing. It wasn’t my desire to make you feel uncomfortable but rather to make you feel welcome. You’ve made your beliefs known, but we have no room for prejudice here. We must all live together or surely we would die.” Dianne said without censoring her thoughts. She hadn’t meant to be so bold, but the words were out before she could stop them.

Bufford’s eyes narrowed, but there was no hint of anger. “I had a good life when I was your age. We had a wonderful home in Atlanta, Georgia. That was a fine city, if ever there was one. I had a lovely wife who played the piano and served marvelous dinner parties for our friends. We had three fine children. Two sons and a little daughter. She was our delight, for she came in our mature years—a surprise, you might say.”

“And then the war came?” Dianne asked softly.

“Yes.”

The single word spoke volumes. The pain was so evident in Bufford’s expression that Dianne hesitated to continue. Something inside her, however, caused her to press for answers. “What happened to them—to your family? Why are you here alone?”

“My sons enlisted. My wife and I, along with our daughter, stayed in Atlanta to roll bandages, tend the sick, and keep the home fires burning. After all, we were going to lick the Yankees by Christmas. I did my duties around Atlanta, working at the hospital and continuing to aid the sick, and my wife rallied support and donations for the troops and their families.” He shook his head.

“My first boy fell in a battle near Great Falls, Virginia, that July of ’61. He was just a child, not quite yet twenty. He’d been so proud to serve—to sustain and defend our way of life, our rights.”

Dianne watched as Bufford folded his hands and lowered his face. He almost looked to be praying. Her heart went out to him as he continued, his voice edged with deep sorrow.

“Our second boy died from wounds he received, also in Virginia. It was near Philmont in November of ’62. He had an arm completely blown off. They just couldn’t save him.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t imagine the pain of losing a child.”

Bufford opened his eyes and looked hard at Dianne. “But you will have that possibility now. You live here in the middle of heathen country, and the Indians are not at all happy with the whites these days. You look down on me for my prejudiced ways, but in all honesty, you will have to face the truth sooner or later. The Indian is just as prejudiced toward you. They don’t care for your manner of life or the belief systems you hold to be true. I know you to be a Christian woman, Mrs. Selby. Well, your Indian folk are certainly not of the Christian persuasion. Oh, of course your aunt, who was raised with a white father, as 8 I understand it, has accepted our ways, but that won’t account for an entire nation of savages. I’ve seen the effects of war, and I’ve no desire to relive it. I’ve honestly given thought to pulling out to head to more civilized realms.”

“There’s danger to be had wherever you go,” Dianne said, quoting something she’d heard Cole say at least a dozen times.

“True enough, but no sense in just sitting by and letting it come to you. Like I did.”

“How so?”

“I watched my wife and daughter die when Atlanta went under siege. They were already sick—they’d contracted dysentery and no matter what remedy I tried, they couldn’t seem to recover. I’d wanted to move them from Atlanta when I heard the soldiers were coming, but there was no chance. They died within hours of each other.” His eyes glazed over. “You wonder at my bitterness, but you see, there’s nothing left me. Hope deserted me the day God took away my beloved wife and little daughter. And for what?” He looked directly at Dianne, and the raw hatred of all he’d known was there for her to see. Dianne cringed.

“I lost my family so a bunch of darkies could go free. So a bunch of illiterate heathens could share the same rights and freedoms that I had? Those people weren’t even Americans. They were brought to this country, albeit against their will, from Africa. What gave them the right to make such a demand as freedom?”

“I don’t recall that they made the demand,” Dianne said. “Of course, I was just a girl when the entire matter began, but as I remember, there were other elements to the War Between the States. States’ rights, for instance. South Carolina left the Union because they wanted to have their own say over what happened in their state. My father used to joke that South Carolina threatened to leave the Union every time the wind changed directions.”

Bufford actually bore a hint of a smile at this. “Well, we Southerners tend to feel strongly about our beliefs.”

“Apparently Northerners felt no different,” Dianne replied with a sigh. “It just seems to me that there were other matters to be resolved.”

“Bah, those things could have been overcome. Everything would have been different if slavery hadn’t been on the agenda.” His anger was evident, but Dianne felt no fear. The man was clearly wounded—just as wounded and near death as the loved ones he’d lost.

“Dr. Bufford,” she said, reaching out to touch his arm, “my loved ones had nothing to do with the death of your family members. You may blame the slaves and their desire to be free, but I believe you would be wrong to do so. Would your wife have wanted you to live out your life like this—with such hatred and scorn for others?”

He looked taken aback by her words. His blue eyes widened as he let the words sink in. “My family had no desire to see the war come or the slaves set free.”

“I’ve no doubt they would have rather the war not come, but honestly, Dr. Bufford, would you rather have had slavery continue? You just don’t seem like the kind of man who would support such an institution. Did you have slaves?”

“Certainly not. We were not a wealthy family by any means. We could not afford servants.”

“Would you have had them if you could have afforded them?” she asked, not at all certain why she felt compelled to keep pushing the matter.

Bufford got up and walked to the window. He stood with his back to her for a very long time. So long, in fact, that Dianne was almost positive he would never answer her question. Just when she thought to ask him to send Koko with the baby, he turned.

“No, Mrs. Selby. I wouldn’t have had slaves in my possession. However, I didn’t think it right to tell other free men what they could and couldn’t do. I saw no reason to deny them their laborers because my conscience wouldn’t make the same choice.”

“My brother Zane told me something a while back. He quoted a statesman from Ireland named Edmund Burke. Mr. Burke said, ‘The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.’ I cannot stand by and allow evil to continue simply because I would not choose to partake in it myself. It’s a little like saying I would willingly allow my ranch foreman to kill anyone he chooses so long as he leaves the workers of the Diamond V alone. Evil is still evil, even when I choose not to participate in it. I didn’t realize the implications then, as I said, for I was quite young and uneducated. The biggest concern I had was whether I’d get to share Sunday afternoon with my friends.”

Bufford seemed to be hearing her words, but his gaze was fixed somewhere over her head. Dianne wondered if it might not be better to just let the matter drop. After all, she could hardly expect to persuade a man who’d been through so much sorrow and grief.
Then again,
she thought,
I’ve known just as much sorrow.
Just as much loss. Maybe not a child of my own or a husband, but the pain is just as real
.

“I cannot blame the slaves or the Southern patriots or the Northern defenders of the Union,” she said softly. “I blame things like hatred and bigotry. I place responsibility on those who deny the truth—who refuse to heed God’s word and warning.”

“After my wife and daughter died,” Bufford began as he walked back to the chair beside Dianne’s bed, “I enlisted. I went with the Confederate soldiers by sneaking out beyond the siege lines. I hoped to make a difference—to save lives that might otherwise have been lost, like my sons’.

“I still believed in my oath to save lives. I still believed I could make things better—to ease the misery of my fellowman.” He leaned against the chair back and shook his head. “But in truth, I could do very little. Good men died despite my efforts. War is not a pretty sight, Mrs. Selby.”

“I know that well enough. I lived in New Madrid, a town that witnessed battles and skirmishes. My father was killed in a small fight—right on the street outside his store. I watched him bleed to death, and no one could help him. He was innocent— he bore no weapons, nor did he desire his sons to bear arms. We were Southern by way of our family heritage, but my father held strong beliefs about preserving the Union. About doing whatever it took so that when everything was said and done, he could still live with the choices he’d made.”

Bufford closed his eyes and shook his head again. “Some choices can never be lived with. Some choices must be expunged in death.”

Dianne was still considering Bufford’s words even as they celebrated Christmas two days later. Every time she looked into the eyes of her newborn son, she couldn’t help but feel a tremor of fear. Would the Indian Wars be settled by the time he’d grown to be a man? And even if they had, would there be other wars for him to participate in?

Bufford seemed to be enjoying the holidays. He ate like a man long starved of decent food and appeared to bear no ill will toward Faith or Malachi or their children. He had seemed to make a peace of sorts with Koko. They talked of healing, and while Dianne had not included herself in the conversation, she often heard comments by each one that seemed to be approved of or respected by the other.

Koko even gave Dr. Bufford a new pair of leather gloves. This had been her primary gift to most everyone on the ranch that year, and Dianne was touched that she’d found it in her heart to share her efforts with a man who had at one time been so rude toward her.

Perhaps he is allowing God to heal his wounded heart,
Dianne thought as she nestled Lucas in her arms. Perhaps in time the good doctor would be able to put the war behind him and let go of his ghosts.